


Opposite

by suzunofuu



Category: Inazuma Eleven, Inazuma Eleven: Ares no Tenbin, Inazuma Eleven: Orion no Kokuin
Genre: Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Memory Loss, Nagumo is a fucking idiot, No Angst, Romance, Silly Romance, University, more or less
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-01
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-20 08:05:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15529827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suzunofuu/pseuds/suzunofuu
Summary: Nagumo doesn't want anything to do with Suzuno, or so he's been telling everyone he knows at uni. Thet's until he wakes up in Suzuno's bed, naked, not knowing how the fuck he got there in the first place.





	Opposite

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know where I was going with this but I needed to write something silly with these two dumb dorks liking each other, so this ended up happening.

The walls are opposite where they are supposed to be. Where there should be nothing, there’s a wall. Where there should be a wall, there’s nothing.

When Nagumo wakes up, the first thing he notices is that his room is inversed. In the exhaustion and confusion he’s feeling, he thinks that somehow he’s fallen asleep upside down or that he’s just disoriented enough to not even recognize his own damn room. Somewhere deep in his mind, he remembers how much he drank last night and accepts that he cannot identify where he is lying. The second thing he notices, long after his head stops spinning and throbbing intensely and his eyes unblur, is that there’s someone lying next to him. More precisely—after he turns slightly to check that there is, in fact, another person in what he supposes is his bed—he spots Suzuno Fuusuke sleeping by his side. Naked.

The third thing he notices is that he too is naked, and that this is, in fact, not his room. It takes every cell of his body for his soul to not jump out of it and exit the atmosphere, maybe even the galaxy.

He takes a deep breath, passes a hand through his sweaty forehead and tries to remember how the hell he ended up in this situation. He only feels even more out of place and control when he can’t quiet pinpoint at which moment of the night he stopped being conscious of his actions. The lack of memories of the past night add up to the tightness of his chest, to the arrhythmia of his heart, and without him even wanting to, his limbs slip out of Suzuno’s touch and get him up on his feet.

His heart is hammering crazily against his ribs, mind unusually wide awake for such an early hour in the morning. He spots his clothes all over the floor, mixed with what he supposes to be Suzuno’s own, and starts to dress up as fast as possible. He needs to get out of this room—out, out, _out_ and _the fuck away_ from whatever the hell they’ve done, hoping no one has seen them and that Suzuno will remember as much as he does. As to say: nothing.

He feels dirty and ashamed in ways he has never felt. Of all people and of all things he could do to embarrass himself, he had to sleep with Suzuno. Out of all. Damn. People.

Don’t get him wrong, it’s not that he is disgusted by Suzuno or that he doesn’t want to have anything to do with him. On the contrary. He has been thirsting after his rival for a very long time, but no one had to know that, even less Suzuno. For years he had built a character to prevent his secret to be known, to avoid having to acknowledge his feelings and have everyone around him judge him. Now it’s out in the open, _he_ is bare and exposed and out in the open for everyone to see. He’s far from feeling content that he’s somehow ended in Suzuno’s bed, far from satisfied or whatever the hell one’s supposed to feel when they end up with the person they like.

He knows he’s not acting wisely, that he’s being taken away by his emotions, that if he stopped two seconds to think about it, the situation wouldn’t be as bad as it seems. But he is being taken away by the embarrassment, he is anxious and out of place and needs to sit down on his bed to _think_. Before he can grab the door’s handle, though, Suzuno’s voice stops him:

“Are you for fucking real?”

Nagumo hasn’t buttoned up his shirt. He has both sides of it fisted together so it stays closed around his torso, his shoes are unlaced and his jeans aren’t buttoned. He knows his image is the least of his problems, but it doesn’t help him feel any less agitated as he turns around and has to present this sad picture to his mate.

When he turns around, he finds Suzuno leaning on his elbows to stare at him. He’s frowning in a way that says he’s angry at both of them, maybe even ashamed and surprised, too. Nagumo’s guilt does nothing but increase.

Suzuno shakes his head and throws his head back into the pillow, a hand covering his eyes. “I can’t fucking believe you.”

“Um, I was just—“

“Get the fuck out of my room.”

Nagumo can’t really move. His body is ready to run away, but his mind knows he has to stay, even if he can’t make out why. He should already be racing down the corridors towards his room, should be hiding away from every single person he knows and planning out a new life out of the academy and away from all of them, yet the exasperation and disbelief in Suzuno’s expression make him wonder what the hell did he do last night to make him believe he remotely wanted to be here today with him, that he wasn’t going to sneak out unnoticed.

He swears to all the Gods humankind ever has created that if he somehow confessed to Suzuno last night he’s going to have to chop his own head off and throw it into a volcano.

As he doesn’t react, Suzuno uncovers his eyes and throws him a look of pure abhorrence and loathe that has his hair standing on edge. He knows they’ve been playing to hate each other for a very long time—he has seen Suzuno stare at him with way more hate and disgust before—but it doesn’t help his heart of clenching uncomfortably inside his chest and his pulse to slow drastically.

“What are you still doing here? Get _out_.”

Nagumo grumbles what has to be some kind of word, unties his tongue and blurts out, “look, I don’t know what the hell we did so I was just—“

“I don’t care,” Suzuno cuts him off. This time he doesn’t sound solely angry and infuriated. He sounds hurt. Humiliated, even. Seriously, what did Nagumo do to him? What the hell did they do last night? “Just get the fuck out of here.”

Without farther ado, Nagumo’s body snaps out of trance and he finds himself marching towards his room, making sure nobody sees him do the walk of shame.

He closes the door and breathes in deep as if he hadn’t taken a breath since he woke up, which he probably hasn’t. He drops down to the floor on his buttocks, groaning loudly into the palm of his hands, face burning with the humiliation of the past events. Who knows who saw them. Who knows what on earth did they do together. Who knows how much Suzuno remembers. Who knows how their relationship has changed without him acknowledging it.

 _Jeez_.

On top of all that, Suzuno had to catch him while he tried to sneak out on him without even saying goodbye. This has to be, more than probably, one of the worst days he’s ever lived.

As he slips into his bed and covers his whole body to hide from the eyes of world, he wishes nobody knows about what they’ve done—or what he _thinks_ they’ve done—and that Suzuno lets it go without holding a grudge against him or mentioning this day ever again, that they can let it slip past casually and return to the point of their lives they were in before he made his way into Suzuno’s _bed_.

Unfortunately for him, when he pokes out of his room the following day after twenty-four hours of self-depreciation and sleep deprival, the first thing anyone and everyone does upon seeing him is give him _the look_. He comforts himself by murmuring at the back of his head that it’s his imagination. After all, he has only crossed paths with three people on his way to the cafeteria, but as he enters it and everyone he remembers being at the party turns when they spot him and makes _that_ _face_ —that awful, knowing face—he can only lower his head and pray for some kind of bomb to go off and kill him.

No bomb goes off and he has to make his way to his usual table where he finds Hiroto and Reina having breakfast, chatting softly. He flops down on a chair before them without saying a word, too into his own head to want to start a conversation, hoping they'll leave him alone.

Reina snorts out a laugh when she sees him, says, “ _there_ you are, popular boy.”

Nagumo groans. He fits half a toast into his mouth so he doesn’t have to speak, no butter or jam on it, just burnt, raw bread into his already dry mouth. He wants to choke himself and fucking die.

“Where were you yesterday? We haven’t seen you since the party.” Hiroto asks, worried. “Have you slept? You look tired-”

“I gant do fie,” he interrupts, mouth full of bread.

Hiroto frowns. “What?”

“ _I want to die_ ,” he repeats in a whisper once he’s swallowed. He feels as if everybody’s eyes are on him, as if everybody is judging him and making fun of the way he looks (they aren’t).

“Did it go _that_ bad?” Reina mocks, seeming very invested in the drama surrounding Nagumo at the moment. She leans in towards him, chin resting on her hand and eyes curious, excited. Not much happens in the academy to keep the students entertained. No wonder that everyone already knows about what they’ve done and is gossiping about it, and those who don’t know will probably be informed shortly.

Hiroto reprimands her, “ _Yagami_.”

“I’m just saying it had to go really badly if he wants to kill himself!” she defends herself. “Look at him! He’s the face of shame.”

“If you’re only going to mock him you should probably go away.”

“He’s the one who sat here! If he wants to go, he can go. I’m not here to help, I’m here to _laugh_.”

Hiroto gives her a serious look. “Seriously, Yagami. Stop. You wouldn’t want us to do this to you.”

Reina rolls her eyes and doesn’t add another word, remaining silent. Hiroto turns towards Nagumo and squeezes his arm comfortingly.

“Want to tell us what happened?”

“I don’t know what the fuck happened!” he roars out, indignant. “I don’t remember anything! I was really fucking drunk.” He drops his head on top of the table, groaning pityingly to himself, arms surrounding his head in hopes that everyone stops looking at him.

Hiroto and Reina share a worried look.

“Wow,” Reina murmurs to herself.

“Haven’t you talked to Fuusuke?” Hiroto wonders, comprehensive and careful, knowing that Nagumo is a second away from snapping.

“No,” he says, solemn, looking up at them through his crossed arms and without straightening up.

Again, Reina can’t help but to snort out. This time, instead of amused, she sounds slightly offended. “No wonder he’s angry.”

“Suzuno is angry?” Nagumo asks, pondering for the first time in the morning where could Suzuno possibly be, since he hasn’t seen him in the cafeteria, in the corridors or in the field when he walked past it.

“Wouldn’t you?” Reina says. “I would be pissed off at you if you slept with me and then disappeared without even saying anything.”

“Someone please kill me,” he begs to no one in particular, hiding into his arms once again. “Who else knows about his?”

“Everyone,” Reina states, an eyebrow lifted and a smirk on her lips.

Hiroto smiles softly and pets his head as if he were a five years old—which is exactly what he feels like, so he doesn’t tell him to stop. “Don’t make a mountain out of this. It’s just a little misunderstanding, okay? Go talk to Suzuno about it and-“

“That is not the problem!” he protests. As if he gives a goddamn fuck about what Suzuno feels or wants. “I don’t care what that dickhead thinks happened! No one was supposed to know I—“ he cuts himself off before he finishes the sentence and betrays himself.

He covers his face with his hands and groans again, frustrated. No one was supposed to know he likes Suzuno. No one was supposed to be tattling about them being together as if they were a goddamn joke or some sort of tv entertainment. This feeling was supposed to be his dirty little secret. He wasn’t supposed to let Suzuno know. They weren’t supposed to do _anything_.

When he puts his hands away, he finds Yagami looking at him with irritation and Hiroto frowning disapprovingly.

“ _What_?” he asks, bothered.

Hiroto opens his mouth to scold him, but Yagami snaps at him faster, angrier, “You _don’t care_ about what he thinks? What the honest fuck is wrong with you?”

“I didn’t say any-“

“You are a total douchebag.”

“I am not-“

“Yes you are. No one was supposed to know? Bitch, we didn’t need this to see you both have been thirsting over each other for years. We’ve known for quite a while.” Hiroto tries to mediate, but Reina holds a hand up in front of his face to stop him. “Don’t come at us with your sorry pitiful ass saying you don’t care about Fuusuke because I swear over my dead body that I will beat you _up_. You both have been playing this ‘we hate each other’ game for quite a long while and we thought that fucking finally you had gotten over it and made up with each other. It was about damn time. And if you’re so ashamed of what you feel or whatever the fuck is up with you that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t have played Suzuno on the first place. You put yourself in this situation so you’re gonna have to get yourself out.”

Once her rant is over, she crosses her arms, leans against her chair and looks away, irritated. Hiroto stares at her for a few seconds, and when he’s sure she’s done talking, he turns to Nagumo and speaks up:

“Although I wouldn’t have put it that way, I agree with her. I don’t know why you want this to be a secret or why you want everyone to believe you don’t care about Fuusuke—“

“I don’t want anyone to believe anything, it’s the truth.”

“—but if you had wanted to keep your feelings secret, you shouldn’t have done what you did.”

Nagumo stares angrily at them for a few seconds, not knowing what to start complaining about first. He looks momentarily at Reina, then back at Hiroto in search of comprehension. “She’s taking this shit to heart and it has nothing to do with her.”

Her head snaps towards him so fast it could’ve cracked. “I’m not-“

“And what did I even do, to begin with?” he continues, ignoring her. “What the fuck could I possibly have done?”

“Just talk to Suzuno, for fuck’s sake,” she spits out.

“I wasn’t asking you,” he retorts.

“Talk to Suzuno,” Hiroto agrees—serious, calm, comforting. “You did nothing wrong. It was sweet.”

Nagumo’s face fires up with the thousand different scenarios that flash through his mind after Hiroto says that word. _Sweet_. He was _sweet_ to Suzuno. What the fuck. “I was _sweet_. Please just set me on fire.”

Reina rolls her eyes. “How old are you? Don’t be a giant baby and go talk to Suzuno already.”

“But _I don’t want to._ ”

“Well, you have to,” she insists. “Look, it’s not that complicated. If you don’t want to have anything to do with him go and tell him right away. It’s as easy as that, although I don’t think that’s what you want to do, huh?”

Nagumo inflates his cheeks and slips down his chair, arms crossed and eyes on the floor. “I don’t know.”

“Why do you even want to keep it secret?”

Nagumo takes a few seconds to grumble out, “I have my reasons.”

“Tell us?” Hiroto insists, cautious.

Nagumo keeps staring down, silent. He doesn’t want to tell them because it doesn’t make any sense and they will only get madder at him. He knows that there’s no point in pretending whatever has happened between them is a lie or a mistake, but that’s all he wants to do, that’s all he want everyone to think: that he fucked up because he was drunk and that Suzuno means nothing to him. He doesn’t know how to share anything but hatred with Suzuno, doesn’t know how to step outside their comfort zone and act as something other than rivals. That’s all they’ve ever been, all everyone has always wanted out of them. If they take that away from him he doesn’t know what’s left, doesn’t know if there’s _anything_ between them, and that scares him to death.

He’s liked Suzuno for some years now. Even before he knew what liking was he liked him. They’ve grown so much and gone through so much shit that he doesn’t want this to go away. Once upon a time, when he thought he was going to lose Suzuno for good, he was so, so immensely glad that something—even if it was this stupid game they like to play—stuck with them and forced them to interact and talk to each other. After so many years of this dynamics, he doesn’t know if they can have anything else, anything better.

He knows it makes no sense he wants to preserve what they had when they can have an apparent better and more interesting relationship, one he’s been waiting for for years. He doesn’t know what they did or said the other night, doesn’t know what Suzuno thinks of it all or what he wants out of it, but he sure as hell doesn’t want to lose what little ties him to Suzuno if there’s no actual proof that they won’t completely drift apart from each other if they try this out.

“Well,” Hiroto continues once he sees Nagumo won’t speak up. “Either if you want to keep up the act or if you want to find out what happened and keep it going, that’s your decision. We cannot tell you what to do.”

“Yes we can,” Reina mumbles to herself.

Nagumo fits the other half of the toast into his mouth and drinks down the by now warm juice in a matter of seconds. He stands up without a word and leaves Reina and Hiroto wondering what he’s going to do.

Nagumo isn’t sure what he should do, but he’s sure about what he _wants_ to do. It is true that if this stupid situation makes him and Suzuno stop talking to each other he will be forever angry at himself, but it is also true that he wants to take the chance, even if all odds are against his favor and he feels as if everyone believes it’ll end badly.

Before he knows it he’s at Suzuno’s door, ready to knock and ask permission to come in. But that’s all he is: ready to come in, not actually knocking or asking for permission, just standing by the door and overthinking about everything that is about to go wrong.

He stands by for a few more seconds and decides to leave this for another moment, decides to come back later, maybe, to prolong the wait so he can think this through. He puts his hand down and as he starts to step away, the door opens and Suzuno stares up at him, startled. The moment he realizes it’s Nagumo in front of him he frowns, angered, and feints to slam the door shut.

“W-Wait!” Nagumo stops him, as taken by surprise as him. “Can we talk?”

Suzuno looks as if a demon would come out of his body and murder him at any second now. “No.”

Suzuno pushes him away and slams the door shut, very, very loudly. After a few attempts at opening and calling out Suzuno’s name, Nagumo gives up on talking to him and sits at the opposite wall to the door. He takes his mobile phone out and texts Suzuno, says, “ _pls open upppp_ ”.

He rests his head on the wall and sighs, exhausted. He’s so nervous his hands are sweaty and unpleasantly warm.

The phone vibrates between his hands and he looks down at it, reads, “ _leave me the fuck alone_.”

He’s known Suzuno long enough to know that if he wanted to be left alone he wouldn’t have answered him. He also knows that he must be really, really angry at him for sneaking out of his room after whatever they did without wanting him to notice. Thank god he didn’t tell Reina or she might have killed him if she knew what he had done. Instead of making Reina murder him, he groans to himself in embarrassment and slams his head back against the wall as punishment. If he hadn’t been so shook and out of his goddamn mind he would have probably stayed in bed and talked to Suzuno as a normal adult would have, but it hadn’t been the case. He is, as Reina said, a giant baby.

“ _I need to talk to you_ ,” he texts back. After a minute, he adds, “ _I’m sorry about what I did_.”

He starts to think Suzuno actually wants him to go away after ten minutes of wait, but just as he’s considering getting up and going to his room, Suzuno’s door cracks open a smidge. Nagumo gets on his feet as fast as his body allows, takes a deep breath and gets into the room. The blinds of Suzuno’s window are halfway down, so the room is slightly darker than the corridor. Nagumo can make Suzuno’s shape before the window, where he’s leaning against his desktop with his arms crossed. Just by being back inside the room he feels immensely ashamed.

“Hey,” he greets, awkward as he’s never been, not knowing what else to do or say.

“Hey?” Suzuno repeats after him, growing all the more irritated.

“Yeah, um.” He looks away from Suzuno, mumbles to himself, “This is awkward.”

“You say?” Suzuno spits out, bothered by Nagumo’s mere presence.

They fall into an extremely uncomfortable silence. The kind of contradictory thoughts that are crossing Nagumo’s mind—and he’s sure Suzuno is having exactly the same thoughts—are some sort of humorous matter, he’s sure. He knows he’s come here in peace and that he’s supposed to be sorting things out with Suzuno. Too bad there’s only a 0,1% of him that’s ready to confess everything he’s been hiding from Suzuno for years and ask him—jeez, he cannot even think about what he wants to ask out of Suzuno. The other 99,9% of him is so used to pretending Suzuno is the biggest dickhead in town that he’s ended up believing so and is having so much trouble trying to not act like an arse towards him.

He bites the inside of his cheek, foot tapping quickly against the floor. It’s not like Suzuno seems open to conversation, but what did he expect? After how he left him, no wonder Suzuno doesn’t want to talk to him. If Suzuno showed interest in what he has to say or  in finding redemption, he’d have it easier to open up to him. They aren’t especially the type to openly say what they want or think. They’re too proud, stubborn and full of their stupid act to act accordingly to what they truly feel. At least they have that in common, right? Didn’t everyone say they were opposites to each other? Nagumo thinks they’re _so_ alike it’s kind of creepy.

“So, um… about the party…” he starts, staring at nowhere in particular, not really knowing what to say next. “I’m… sorry? About what I did?” He hopes that’s what Suzuno wanted to hear, but as he glances at him he knows that might have been to complete opposite of what he should have said.

Suzuno vows his head down and rubs gently at his temples, irritated, mind about to blow and guts twisting unpleasantly. “Alright. What else?”

“What… else?” he repeats, confused.

Suzuno gives him a cold, unforgiving look. “You were sneaking out of my room not even a day ago.”

“Yeah, that… that wasn’t a hundred percent intentional.” He stops himself before he says something he doesn’t mean or want to say. He looks directly at Suzuno and tries to decipher what he wants out of this, what he needs him to say, but sees nothing but complete and absolute fury directed at him. He huffs, needing to calm the fuck down. “Okay, I don’t know if you want me to be nice or sincere, so just tell me before I fuck this up even more than it already is.”

“Say whatever you have to say or leave.” Suzuno grunts, looking up at the ceiling. “Honestly”

“Al…right.” Nagumo stares around the room, uncomfortable. “Um, see, the thing is that I don’t actually remember what happened during and after the party, so I’m kind of at a loss right now.“

“Wow,” Suzuno mocks depreciatingly. “Just wow.”

“I was drunk,” he defends himself.

“I could have guessed that.”

“You don’t have to be a prick about this, I’m trying—“

“ _I_ am the prick?”

“—to fix things, alright?” Nagumo passes a hand through his hair. He hadn’t really thought about what to ask him, what to tell him, how to get the information out of him. He just knew _he_ needed to see Suzuno before everything was lost, but now that they are face to face it is only becoming more and more clear to him that there is no right way to do this.

He drops back against the door, arms crossed and eyes on the floor. Suzuno deflates, the anger fleeting and being replaced by this weak, pathetic feeling of humiliation and deceive that has his core’s heat lowering at least nine degrees.

In a last attempt to not embarrass himself any further, Suzuno asks, “you really don’t know what happened?”

Nagumo looks up at him, this guilty look in his eyes that says _no_ , that screams _I have no idea what we did_. It makes Suzuno’s heart ache.

“No,” Nagumo mutters, remorseful.

“Okay,” Suzuno musters up to say. He straightens up, shaking off the deceive Nagumo’s just thrown at him and the newfound hope he had adopted after the party. As respectfully and serenely as possible, he says, “You should leave, then.”

“What? No!” Nagumo exclaims, to both of their surprises. “I don’t want to go?”

Suzuno huffs, exasperated. “Then _what_ do you want?”

“I don’t know?”

One of Suzuno’s eyes twitches. “I swear if you’ve come here to mock me-“

“No, that’s not-“ Nagumo rushes to interrupt him. “I’m not here to mock you. Promise.”

They stare at each other, both of them confused and embarrassed and not knowing where to hide their faces, both of them wanting this to go in the right direction but having no idea how to leave the path they’ve been walking for years. Nagumo presses his hands together, staring away from Suzuno, and tries to calm himself down.

“Okay, um. What if we just, I don’t know, sit and talk?” he tries, more of a mumble than an actual question or offer. “Let’s… sort this out, yeah?”

Suzuno thinks it through for a few seconds. Without saying a word, he moves towards his bed and sits on it, legs and arms crossed, staring straight so he doesn’t see Nagumo sitting beside him and facing him with a look of incertitude Suzuno had never seen on him.

“Okay, uh, I just really want to know what happened so I can, I don’t know, understand why you’re upset?” Nagumo mumbles, unsure of where he’s going with this, or if he will upset Suzuno any further.

Suzuno doesn’t seem upset, though—at least not any more than he already was—he looks _flustered_.

Suzuno clears his throat, hands tightening where they are gripping at his arms, which are still crossed. Nagumo notices the unintentional gesture and finds himself blushing, somehow liking that Suzuno is nervous around him.

“We danced,” Suzuno confesses, as imperturbable as he can allow himself, still not looking Nagumo’s way.

“ _Danced_?” Nagumo pushes, needing something more to understand the situation.

“Yeah. We danced together for a long while.”

“How long is… a long while?”

“The whole night,” Suzuno elaborates, “until the party was over, actually.”

Nagumo stops himself from groaning in embarrassment yet again. No wonder everyone knows about Suzuno and he if they saw them dancing out and about during the whole damn party like some kind of lovebugs. _Jeeeeeeeez_.

“Then you walked me to my room,” Suzuno continues without need of Nagumo to push him any farther, “and kissed me. Also for a long while. And then we got into the room. You know how that ended.”

Again, _jeez_.

This time Nagumo does groan and hide his face between his hands. He’s glad that Suzuno wanted to have this with him, or at least he hasn’t shown the opposite, which is enough for Nagumo. He’s glad they did what they did because it finally opened a door he wouldn’t have been able to open without the help of alcohol. He wishes he could remember what he felt, every little detail of what happened, because it would help him understand at which point of their relationship they’re at. He guesses they’re behind the starting line, to say the least, taking in account that everything they won has been lost with his memories.

Suzuno uncrosses his arms and presses his fists to the mattress, face up, eyes on the floor. “Look, I get it, it was a mistake. You don’t have to-“

“It was only a mistake because I can’t remember,” he cuts in, immediately heating up due to the confession. “I- I mean- It’s not fair that I don’t remember, you know?”

Suzuno seems to finally relax where he’s sitting. He sighs and eyes him carefully, still flustered, still nervous and ashamed, still not knowing where they are trying to go.

“And why did you‒ you know‒ _accept_?” he asks around, not really facing him, hands moving awkwardly around.

Suzuno turns completely towards him and eyes him up and down. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah?” he says, flustered and confused.

Suzuno shakes his head. “Why did _you_ ask me to dance with you?”

Nagumo blushes furiously and looks away. Well _obviously_ because he likes him. No shit. “Thought it’d be fun?”

Suzuno stares at him for a few seconds in pure disbelief and then convers his mouth and bursts out laughing, all the tension they had built easing off their bodies and minds, his honest laugh lighting up their mood and taking all the seriousness off the atmosphere. Nagumo can’t help but smile as Suzuno laughs at him, his heart pounding furiously at the sight of Suzuno’s happiness. Okay, yeah, he must admit that there’s something enchanting about Suzuno, something that he really, really loves and adores in levels he hadn’t imagined could be possible to experience.

He can’t believe he’s just thought about Suzuno as _enchanting_ and _adoring._ What _is with him_? Boy, he really is too far gone for him. He hadn’t realized just _how_ far gone until today. Having feelings is horrible.

Suzuno uncovers his mouth and looks at him in disbelief. Nagumo realizes this is _the_ moment, _the_ chance. They’re sitting next to each other, close enough that if one of them leant in they could kiss, sharing this intense, penetrating stare as if the more they looked at each other, the bigger the chance of actually closing the gap and kissing would be.

Nagumo blushes even more, staring away from Suzuno. “Okay, so, we’re good?”

Suzuno nods, shrugs, feeling awkward. “I guess?”

“Um.” Nagumo doesn’t dare look at him when he asks, voice soft, “was it good? You know, the thing.”

Suzuno snorts, eyebrow raised and a smirk on his lips. He stands up, walks to the door and grabs its handle. “I’m not going to tell you.”

Nagumo frowns. “Why not?”

Suzuno opens the door slightly and motions with his head for Nagumo to leave. “Time to leave.”

Nagumo stands up, hands on his hips, indignant. “I’m _not_ leaving! We’re still not done here, you know.”

Suzuno lifts his eyebrow with disdain, playful, challenging. He closes the gap of the door but doesn’t let go of its handle. “Is there anything else you want to say?”

Nagumo inflates his cheeks. “No?”

Suzuno rolls his eyes. It takes a second for Nagumo to build up enough courage to approach Suzuno and shut his mouth just as he’s starting to say something by practically pressing his forehead to Suzuno’s, looking at him dead in the eye with all the determination he doesn’t feel. He was supposed to walk up to him and kiss him but he just—he _can’t._ He can’t straight up go and kiss Suzuno.

Suzuno leans away from him, startled, frowning, awaiting. Nagumo fills his lungs with air and keeps it in for a few seconds before he bends down and lets it all out, groaning, “ _shit, this is so embarrassing_.” He lets his head rest against Suzuno’s shoulder, hands on his hips, staying still in the most uncomfortable position ever imagined.

“Haruya…” Suzuno doesn’t say his name in any particular provoking or insinuating way, yet it still has the hair at his neck standing on end. Suzuno chuckles out a whisper, “you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

 _But I do want to kiss you_ , he thinks, stubbornly. “It’s not _easy_ , alright?”

“I know.”

“We’ve had this dispute going on for years, I don’t know how to— to— you know!” he grumbles, face burning in pure embarrassment.

Suzuno smiles and puts a hand on his shoulder. “You’ll get used to it.”

Nagumo leans back and straightens up to look at him with a frown. “That’s not fair! You’ve got a whole night of dancing and kissing and—the other thing ahead of you to accept whatever this is,” he says motioning between the two of them. “I don’t remember any of it!”

Suzuno stares longingly at him, soft and prudent, understanding. Nagumo’s pouting, his whole face red, eyes on the floor, so Suzuno puts the hand that’s on his shoulder on his cheek and lifts his face. It’s not like he knows how to do this with Nagumo, either, but one of them has to take the step they want to take, or else they’re going to stay trapped in this awkward situation forever after. Nagumo looks up at him, nervous, expectant, the hand on his cheek making his pulse race uncontrollably.

“Let’s get this straight,” Suzuno starts, serious, “you want to kiss me.”

Nagumo looks away but nods, blushing all the way down to his chest and up to his hair.

“Because you like me.”

Nagumo nods again, slower.

“Well. I want you to do it, so what are you waiting for?”

Nagumo mumbles something under his breath, then says out loud, “I’m… waiting for it to feel right?”

Suzuno shakes his head, smiles softly and, to Nagumo’s surprise and contentment, leans in to kiss him. Nagumo’s breath hitches, his skin crisping and stomach doing a backwards triple mortal flip inside his body. Suzuno puts his other hand on his other cheek and brings him closer, lips sliding against Nagumo’s tenderly, cautious. Nagumo stays put, frozen yet melting, letting his mouth do the talking.

Suzuno separates, presses a peck on his lips and opens his eyes to look at him, Nagumo’s own a little blurry and unfocused when he tries to look Suzuno in the eyes.

“Feels right?” Suzuno guesses, keeping Nagumo’s face close to him.

“I—“ Nagumo clears his throat. “Yeah, feels right.”

Suzuno smiles, “good,” and leans back in to kiss him again, darting out his tongue to deepen the kiss.

Well, Nagumo thinks, if they’re going to be open about whatever it is they’re going to share from now on and have everyone chitchat about them, he can, at least, enjoy himself.

He doesn’t remember ever asking Suzuno to dance with him, or kissing him after the party, or what they did when they got into Suzuno’s room, so he has no idea how to feel normal about what they are doing. He doesn’t know how to pull Suzuno closer, how to let him know he wants more, how to press him back against the door or grip at his clothes. He’s at a complete loss, but he guesses he only has to let himself go and enjoy the moment, to let Suzuno guide him through these unstill waters to the nearest shore.

Reina smiles knowingly when they cross paths after he’s come out of Suzuno’s room once they’re done talking, an eyebrow raised at him and offering a teasing, playful wink that makes Nagumo boil in what he wants to be anger but is actual embarrassment.

“Guess that went right, huh?” she sniggers as she walks away from him, loud enough for the whole corridor to hear her. If Nagumo weren't too occupied rushing down the hallway, he would have certainly started a tiny little scandalous fight with her.

People do talk about them and their relationship once they find out, to Nagumo’s dismay. In the end, it _is_ surprising and a very good and interesting gossip that the two members of the academy that hated each other most—or at least pretended to—are now hooking up. There’s still a lot of arguing between the two of them, but there’s also a lot of angry kissing and tugging from the other towards themselves and snickering and laughing it off. No one is used to their new found connection, not even themselves, but they sure as hell get comfortable enough with each other in a surprisingly short time and leave what used to be their act behind.

After some weeks, Nagumo gets also used to the walls being inverted when he wakes up. He gets used to having someone perched against him or sleeping on his chest, gets used to falling asleep with someone between his arms or by his side. He doesn’t know where this is taking them or how long it’ll last, but he can only hope it takes them far and lasts as long as humanly possible, that they don’t lose each other in the way, because nothing can compare to waking up to hearing and feeling Suzuno’s soft breath and tranquil heartbeat as he sleeps on top of him. But don’t tell Suzuno that, or he won’t let Nagumo forget about it in a very long time.

And also don’t call it love. If he wasn’t ready to stop abhorring Suzuno and accept he may have a crush on him, he’s absolutely not ready to even consider being in love with him. That’s a step he’ll have to take another day.


End file.
